Noel Gallagher made Olympics wait for Wonderwall

Noel Gallagher made Olympic organisers wait until the last minute before giving permission for his song 'Wonderwall' to be performed at the closing ceremony

Noel Gallagher made Olympic organisers wait until the last minute before allowing 'Wonderwall' to be performed at the closing ceremony.

The former Oasis musician was asked to sing his band's iconic track but turned the opportunity down, leaving his brother - the group's former singer, Liam - and his band Beady Eye to perform.

However, before they could perform at Sunday's (12.08.12) event, Noel had to give his permission, as he wrote the song.

He told radio station XFM: "They had to re-record it and send it to me and I did play a bit of cat and mouse with them for a few days. I took it to Friday night (10.08.12) at 10pm before I said yes, and they were s**ting it."

Noel, 45, said his reason for turning down the chance to perform at the show - which also saw Spice Girls, One Direction, Kaiser Chiefs, The Who and Madness take the stage - was because they asked him to mime the song.

He added: "Then they wanted me to do it acoustically, and wanted me to mime. I'm all for miming in TV shows, I love that. It would save me a lot of messing about.

"But if you're in a stadium with 80,000 people and you're pretending? I said I could play live and one of the organisers said, 'It's a big gig.'

"I said, 'Really? I do this for a living?'

"I'd only had a few days off and they wanted me to re-record the song, then 14 days' rehearsals. In the end I was like, 'I'd rather watch it on the telly.'"

Oasis split in 2009 after a huge fall out between guitarist Noel and singer Liam. Noel has since released his High Flying Birds debut solo album, while Liam and the other members of Oasis formed Beady Eye.